BOX SCORE
SIOUX CITY, Iowa --- Christine Douglas recorded 11 kills including the 1,000th of her Biola career as the Eagles handed Spring Hill University (Ala.) just its second loss of the season in a 25-17, 25-18, 25-13 victory in a pool play match at the 2011 NAIA Volleyball National Championships in the Tyson Events Center on Tuesday night.
Biola improves to 24-12 with its fourth-straight win while dropping the Badgers to 39-2 on the season.
Douglas becomes the 11th Biola player to reach the 1,000 kill plateau and is the second-fastest to reach the mark at Biola. But she was not the only Biola player to have a solid match. Sarah McAtee, Amy Weststeyn and Rachel Buckley each had eight kills and no errors as the trio combined for 24 kills and no errors in 37 total attacks.
"The girls were well prepared and executed very well," said Head Coach Aaron Seltzer. "Everybody played well and everyone contributed. We did not make many errors, hitting or otherwise. Overall it was a great team effort against a strong team."
The Eagles dominated the match from start to finish, leading nearly the entire match. Biola led by a slim margin to open the first set, holding a 10-9 edge after a three-point run by the Badgers. The Eagles would respond with a quick 6-2 run to turn it into a 16-11 game and would let Spring Hill get no closer than four the rest of the way.
The story was the same in the second set as Biola opened up 15-11 lead near the midway point. However, the Badgers cut into the lead with a four-point run and made it a 16-15 game. The Eagles answered right back with a 5-1 run to break the set open and ended up wrapping it up on a 9-3 run. Douglas had back-to-back kills which made it 20-16 with the second one being her 1,000th.
In the final set, Spring Hill opened with its first lead of the match, jumping out 3-1 early on. They would lead for the final time at 5-4 only to see Biola go back up with back-to-back kills by Douglas. Still leading by one at 9-8, Biola rolled off a 8-1 run with two kills by Weststeyn, two by McAtee and a pair of aces by Christian Woodruff. The Badgers would get no closer the rest of the way as the Eagles cruised to the win.
Yiting Cao led all attackers with 16 kills, right near her NAIA-best average of 5.4 per set coming in. Cassandra Marchand-Stewart added 11 kills and no errors in 16 attempts for a .688 attack percentage.
Biola now turns its sights to the No. 4 seed in the pool and the No. 25 team overall: Freed-Hardeman University (Tenn.). The Lions lost in three to top-seed Embry-Riddle (Fla.) Tuesday, but the scores were much closer than would expected at 25-20, 27-25, 25-13. The match is slated to tip off at 3:15 p.m. Central Time (1:15 p.m. PT).
